Jobless Reincarnation: The King with a Mental Problem

Having bid farewell to the golden beach, the king and the witch continued their journey north.

The borders of the Kingdom of Asura are more blurred than one might imagine.

There were no high walls, no watchtowers, and not even boundary markers.

It's as if this land itself isn't quite sure where it belongs.

The road narrowed, transforming from a main road wide enough for two horse-drawn carriages to a gravel road only large enough for a single cart. The farmland on either side gradually thinned out, replaced by vast stretches of wilderness, where waist-high wild grass swayed in the wind like a gray-green sea.

"From the moment we reach the mountains, we're in the Crimson Dragon's Upper Jaw," Lokishi continued, pointing to the towering, continuous mountain range. "This mountain range itself is a dividing line. Beyond it lies the three great magical kingdoms of Nellis, Lanoa, and Bashelan, and further northwest is the Holy Land of Swords."

Mambo walked slowly, stepping on the gravel. The wheels creaked and groaned as they rolled over the stones, like an old wooden door swaying in the wind.

"And then?" Wang leaned against the cart, arms crossed. "Where did the dragon go?"

"Dragons are usually found near mountain peaks at higher altitudes."

Loki pulled her scarf up to cover half her face. "Besides, red dragons are social animals. They consider the mountaintop their territory and don't wander around. Even when they're hungry, they hunt monsters together, and once they hunt, they can stay on the mountaintop for a long time."

"So the baby dragons are homebodies like Rudy, huh? But shouldn't their enormous size mean they're always hunting and eating?"

"I don't know," came a muffled voice from behind the scarf. "Dragons are still legendary creatures for most people; they're part of the mystery themselves. Very few people have actually seen them, and even fewer have come back alive to tell their stories."

"That's great! We only need to eat it once to last a long time. If we were dragons, we wouldn't need Mambo to carry so much stuff."

Mambo snorted, seemingly agreeing with the suggestion.

Several days later, they arrived together at the coastline of the Red Dragon's upper jaw.

The scenery here is completely different from that in the south.

The sea here is wilder and fiercer. Waves higher than a person crash against the black rocks, spraying white mist and producing a muffled roar. There are no sandy beaches, only pebbles of all sizes and rounded stones worn smooth by the sea. The cold from the north mingles with the dampness of the sea, filling the air with a strong, salty smell.

But there are also things here that are not found in the south—

Quiet.

It wasn't the kind of quiet where you couldn't hear anything; it was the kind of quiet where "even the gods have forgotten about this place."

There were no fishing villages, no farmland, no roads, and even birds were rarely seen.

There was only the sea, the wind, the rocks, and the occasional sunlight that peeked through the clouds.

"This is it." I jumped off the cart and looked around. "If we go further north, it will be colder and the wind will be stronger. There's also a grove of trees nearby where we can camp and take shelter from the wind."

Luo Qixi also jumped out of the car, wrapped her coat tighter, and stood on tiptoe to look north.

There was indeed a dark forest on the distant hillside, its canopies tilted in one direction by the wind, as if someone were pressing their heads down and forbidding them from straightening up.

"Hopefully it will end before winter," Luo Qixi said, pulling her coat tighter around her and looking around. "Otherwise, we'll be trapped. I've heard that the snow here can be knee-deep in winter."

"Anyway, the food prepared is limited, and we'll have to leave when we've eaten most of it. And I have a feeling it won't be long."

The king and the witch drove the Mambo into the forest.

Mambo walked very slowly, the wheels rolling over the gravel, making the pots and pans on the cart clang and clatter all the way.

After practicing for a while, my skill in building houses with earth magic has improved further. Combined with the ability to store magic in advance using a natural barrier, a magical spell was born.

After clearing a space, the Shadow Lord clapped his hands and shouted, "Secret Technique: Creation of the Royal Land - Shadow Dwelling City - Instant Speed ​​Building - Zero Type - Modified!"

To be honest, coming up with a name is really difficult. But it's undeniably cool.

A neat building, constructed of bluish-gray stone and large expanses of smooth glass, rose from the ground.

Modern minimalist architecture has appeared in a medieval forest.

Although a house has been built with stone, it is not enough to build a house with only stone.

Stone doesn't have strong heat insulation properties; it's only good for wind resistance. Fortunately, a lot of trees were cut down while clearing the land, so Wang became a home improvement contractor, using wood and a circular saw to make insulation layers and furniture.

The house wasn't big, so even the renovation work was completed quickly.

Although the house is a bit simple, it's fine for a short stay.

It was made so small to keep warm, not to deliberately stick close to Luo Qixi.

Absolutely not!

The king rejoiced in his wisdom and masterpiece.

The witch looked at the house, which was much prettier than before, and sighed.

"I feel like you'll make a lot of money building houses in the future."

The king's joy froze on his face.

Even after being transported to another world, I still have to be a civil engineer or something...

Night fell quickly.

The king and the witch sat side by side by the fireplace in the room. The firelight illuminated part of the room, casting long shadows of the two of them against the stone wall behind them.

Luo Qixi was in charge of the main course. She squatted in front of the pot, stirring the soup with a wooden spoon while tossing in chopped potatoes and dried meat with her other hand. Her movements were practiced, repeated countless times at countless campsites. The firelight reflected on her profile, turning her eyelashes golden, and two small flames danced in her pupils.

"Have you prepared the basic principles of the magic you're going to experiment with?" She didn't even look up, continuing to stir the soup.

"Probably." I sat down next to her, washing an apple with water magic. "The idea is roughly to create ultra-high temperature and ultra-high pressure, then change something to release powerful energy."

That "something" is called the atomic nucleus, that "change" is called nuclear fusion, and that "powerful energy" comes from the great mass-energy equivalence equation.

I don't intend to experiment with nuclear fission; I intend to directly create nuclear fusion.

After all, the pollution and disasters caused by radiation after fission are too dangerous.

I don't believe our current healing and detoxification magic can cure nuclear radiation.

"That sounds a bit too simple," said Loki.

"The difficulty lies here—extremely high temperature and pressure. How to achieve this? How much magic power will be required? Right now, we only have some ideas."

I set the washed apples aside and then used earth magic to create a stone baking pan.

"How's the witch's new magical idea coming along?"

"After analyzing the thunder cumulonimbus cloud based on your theory, I also have some guesses about the King-level magic [Lightning].

Luo Qixi put down the wooden spoon, turned to look at me, and rested her hands on her knees.

"It should be a variant of Haurollen cumulonimbus. The difference is that after the cloud forms, it does not release moisture as rain, but instead allows it to supercool, constantly generating lightning through friction, and finally controlling the cloud to produce a large number of thunderstorms."

"No need for specific inheritance, just by looking at the name, you can deduce the principle and develop it on your own?" I put the apple in the fireplace to roast. "Truly worthy of being the witch who explored the forbidden with me."

"And there's the water blade magic you failed to develop at home before." She reached into the basket next to her and took out a few berries, popping them into her mouth one by one, her cheeks puffed out. "After seeing your dust crystal circular saw, I also have some ideas. I can use one hand to release a high-pressure water gun, and the other hand to control the cooling and form small ice crystals at the same time—that should be able to develop a variant of the ice water blade."

"The original water-jet magic wasn't exactly a failure." I rotated the slightly softened apple over the fire to ensure even heating. "It was abandoned because it was too inefficient. Although adding sand could increase its power, for some reason, it was less efficient than directly controlling the sand. That's why the more efficient dust crystal circular saw was developed."

"Speaking of which, I've also had some guesses about this." Luo Qixi stood up, walked to the pot, scooped up some soup with a wooden spoon, blew on it, and tasted it. Then she turned around and held the spoon to my lips, "Try it, is it salty enough?"

I paused for a moment, then opened my mouth and put the spoon in my mouth.

"...It's a little bland."

"Really?" She took back the spoon, added a pinch of salt, stirred it again, and then scooped up a little more and handed it to me. This time she didn't blow on it; she just looked at me.

I took a bite.

"just."

"That's good." She smiled and squatted back down by the pot.

The fire crackled.

"I think everyone has their strengths and weaknesses in magic," Loki continued, stirring the soup as she spoke. "For example, Silphi is good at wind and healing magic, but not fire magic. Rudy is good at earth and water magic, but not healing magic. As for me, I'm especially good at ice and water magic, but not earth magic. I don't see any obvious weaknesses in you, but your earth magic is clearly beyond what's expected."

According to this theory, my water blade's power can't be increased. What I'm not good at is probably healing magic and water magic, but the Reality Marble superficially makes up for this weakness.

"It seems that's true." I took the roasted apples off the fire, sprinkled them with icing sugar, and put them back in the fire. "Rudy's swamp is ridiculously efficient; even the water jet with added sand is the most powerful."

"That's right. But when it comes to condensing stones or minerals, your efficiency far surpasses everyone else's." Luo Qixi tapped on the glass window beside her. "With glass of this quality, you could make a fortune just by selling it."

Although it looks like it was created by simply clapping your hands, it was actually the product of creating quartz sand and pure alkali with earth magic, and then melting them with fire magic...

The debt of gratitude for the inherent barrier is never enough, but...

"The Shadow Lord turned construction foreman? I'm not going to do something that ruins my image."

"I just feel that you'll never be poor again in this lifetime." Luo Qixi sighed, took the pot off the stove and put it on the ground. "The money I made following you on this trip is more than I've made in the first half of my life."

"The poor only have a little money." I took the baked apple out, stuck it on a wooden stick, and placed it by the pot as a dessert. "Of course, you have to make money from the rich. Although it's mainly because Emily was very generous in the end."

Luo Qixi didn't reply immediately. She picked up a bowl, ladled out two bowls of soup with a wooden spoon, handed one to me, and held the other for herself. Steam rose from the rim of the bowl, blurring her face.

"I don't have to worry about money, I can just do what I like." She lowered her head and blew on the soup. "I never thought that being with you would lead me to the adventurer's life I've always dreamed of."

"What was life like for adventurers back then?"

"Most of the time, there aren't any suitable jobs waiting for me." She took a sip of soup and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. "The pay isn't high either, just enough to barely make ends meet. Occasionally, a job pays more, but it's also more dangerous. And there are a lot of random jobs..." She paused, "Thinking about what happened afterward is pretty disgusting."

She sighed.

"If it weren't for my dream, I would have given up being an adventurer long ago."

"I knew it." I broke off a piece of bread, dipped it in the soup, and stuffed it into my mouth. "Adventurers and all that, it just sounds cool. In reality, most of them are just a bunch of people who don't have much money, have some fighting skills, and get together because of their passion."

"Ha... that's a really painful description." Loki laughed, placing the bowl on her lap. "Most adventurers seem to have entered the profession simply because it's 'cool.' Then they either die, or they find it's not what they imagined and retire, or... they're the truly capable ones who live the life they wanted."

"What kind of person does the witch want to be? Or rather, what does the witch plan to do after this trip is over?"

"We've gotten a bit carried away..." She finished the last drop of soup in her bowl, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, then placed the bowl on the ground, braced herself with her hands behind her back, and looked up at the sky. "In the meantime, I plan to first develop an ice-water blade using my expertise in ice magic, based on the theory I just discussed. Then I'll refine my magic circuits, striving to make some basic spells cast without incantation. I'll treat lightning as an additional experiment."

She paused.

"After our trip, I plan to go to the Kingdom of Shilon. There's a maze nearby that I'd like to try and conquer. After that... I don't have any plans for now."

I took the baked apple off the branch and handed one to her.

"The forbidden fruit is ready."

Luo Qixi took it, took a bite, and chewed with her cheeks puffed out. The crispness of the caramel bursting and the sweet, soft fruit flesh melted in her mouth.

"It's just a baked apple, why call it forbidden fruit?" she asked vaguely.

"It is said that the gods planted a tree in the Garden of Eden that could bring wisdom, but forbade people to eat it." I also took a bite of my share. "Because after eating it, people understood good and evil and were no longer pure. After eating the forbidden fruit, people were driven out of Paradise and came to earth."

"Where did you hear the story?"

"...Rudy's place." Wang lied without batting an eye.

[Currently Available Information & Attributes]

Everyone has talents that suit them and things they are not good at.

Applying this to magic, just as magic stones have their own properties, magicians also have their own strengths and weaknesses.

There are various speculations about the reasons for its formation, but there is currently a lack of a definitive theory.